Asus sets lofty sales goals for Zenfone 4 and beyond

Asus is learning on the fly about the smartphone market. The Zenfone 2 brought an aggressive price point and the Zenfone 3 upped the price and increased the consumer resentment. People these days want to see cheap prices and there has been some disappointment from consumers who wanted a cheaper Zenfone 3 Deluxe.

In a recent Digitimes interview, Jerry Shen, Asus CEO talked about the sales objective for the Zenfone 4 and beyond.  In the three years, Shen expects Asus to ship 35-40 million units. That’s their target.

In 2016 Asus shipped 20 million smartphones which was a 5% growth from the previous year.

The Zenfone 4 will be introduced in Q2 2017 which falls to the Computex 2017 show no doubt. From that show, hopefully Asus will get the phones to market faster than with the Zenfone 3 rollout. Additionally with a big goal, Asus may need to look at finding ways to bring down the price slightly. Certainly markets reacted unfavorably to the Zenfone 3 pricing even though the prices are still significantly cheaper than the top flagship phones.

[source: Digitimes]

Zenfone 3 Zoom price is $399 USD for 64GB storage, 4GB RAM model

Enough with the misinformation out there! The issue at hand is that Asus in China announced the Pegasus 3S along with the Zenfone 3 Zoom pricing for the China market. So as would be expected, a LOT of websites and news sources have made a guesstimate from the price in China what the price in the US would be. This is wrong folks! All we have seen is a lot of comment ranting and a lot of inflated and incorrect Zenfone 3 Zoom price guessing.

With that rant out of the way, here is the US price for the Zenfone 3 Zoom (ZE553KL) model with 64GB storage and 4GB RAM.

$399 USD

Please trust us and plan your next phone purchase accordingly. The Zenfone 3 Zoom is a camera powerhouse with an unmatched 5000mAh battery. Big battery, great camera, nice design means good value. It doesn’t sport the fastest Snapdragon processor but as the Zenfone 3 (ZE552KL) has shown, the S625 is a more than capable processor which emphasizes battery life and cost savings over processing bravado.

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Android 7.0 Nougat update for Zenfone 3 – Instructions and Details

Great news everyone! Well, right now it’s great news for Zenfone 3 (ZE552KL / ZE520KL) owners. This is starting in the Philippines and should be rolling out globally in short order. There is nothing official for other Zenfone 3 models yet, but certainly the Android 7.0 Nougat update will be coming based on this development.

We know one thing. First backup your device!

We are just fact finding right now and will be adding to this post in the next hour. Stay tuned for more of this breaking news!

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New Zenfone Pegasus 3S unveiled in China

At the end of December there was a new Asus phone listed on the TENAA website. We clarified that it was not a Zenfone 4 at the time, and now we have confirmation that it is in fact a new Zenfone Pegasus model.

It’s a budget orientated model which is part of the Pegasus strategy. What’s impressive here is the 5,000mAh battery which should impress most consumers out there. Battery life is highly valued and the 5,000mAh puts it in the top of the class.

Processor wise, the Pegasus 3S comes with a MediaTek MT6750 processor at 1.5GHz. You will find 3GB RAM inside and either a 32GB or 64GB onboard storage option. The display is 5.2-inch with a resolution of  1280 x 720 pixels. There is a 13MP rear and 8MP front facing camera as well.

Price is 1,999 yuan for the 64GB model. Do not expect to see this phone outside of the China market.

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Zenfone 3 Zoom coming to Canada

I don’t think we are speaking out of turn here. The newly announced Zenfone 3 Zoom (ZE553KL) appears poised for a Canada release.

This claim is based on information posted on the Industry Canada government website. There we see the model ASUS_Z01HD, shown as the Zenfone 3 Zoom which was submitted on December 22, 2016. We’ve already seen this Zenfone 3 Zoom on the US based FCC website so North America shoppers can start planning for this.

zenfone-3-zoom-in-canada

The Zenfone 3 Zoom is phonecentric as the name suggests, but it’s more than that. It’s a smartphone featuring a 5,000mAh battery. A lot of the innards are similar to the Zenfone 3 (ZE552KL/ZE520KL).

We believe the price of the Zenfone 3 Zoom is $399 US, which in Canada may be around $100 more expensive. We will update with price details as soon as possible.

zenfone-3-zoom-official-canada

[source: Industry Canada]